Beach Boys to play at Freeman Arts Pavilion Aug. 25

The Beach Boys will perform at 7 p.m., Wednesday, Aug. 25, at Freeman Arts Pavilion in Selbyville.

When Sirius-XM launched its Beach Boys channel, the group’s lead singer Mike Love got together with former band members Brian Wilson, Al Jardine and David Marks, as well as current Beach Boy Bruce Johnston, for a question-and-answer session to promote the channel.

On the surface, it seemed like a get-together that could have been quite awkward. Instead, Love said, there were nothing but good vibrations that day. “It was very positive, that whole get-together. Nothing about that Sirius thing was negative, as far as I can see,” said Love.

A key reason one might have expected a chilly atmosphere that day on Sirius goes back to a 50th anniversary tour in 2012 that ended in what seemed to be an abrupt manner. The move was widely viewed as a firing of Wilson, Jardine and Marks, and Love was villainized for the tour’s demise. Of course, that was nothing new for Love, who has been branded, mainly by fans of Brian Wilson, as one of the biggest jerks in music, largely for his treatment of Wilson.

To his credit, Love was plenty amiable in this interview, spending a generous amount of time talking about his recent solo albums and the Beach Boys, the group he co-founded in 1961 with three cousins, brothers Brian, Carl and Dennis Wilson, and friend Jardine. He responded directly to queries about the reunion tour and other issues that have made him the “anti-Christ” to Brian Wilson fans, as he put it in his 2017 autobiography, “Good Vibrations: My Life as a Beach Boy.”

He maintains he didn’t fire anyone from the Beach Boys and that the 70 shows the group played exceeded the 50 that were required in the contract.

Another issue that has earned Love the ire of Wilson fans is his early ‘90s lawsuit against Wilson, in which Love successfully gained songwriting credits to 35 songs. Love wrote at least some of the lyrics for many early Beach Boys songs, including hits like “California Girls,” “I Get Around” and “Help Me Rhonda.” It’s one of multiple lawsuits that have been filed over the years by Love against Wilson.

Love blames Wilson’s father, Murry, who managed the Beach Boys in the early years, for excluding him from the songwriting credits. Love said because Murry had passed away, his only recourse to get songwriting credits was to sue Brian Wilson. In the end, Love won his case, and he and his cousin settled on a reported payment of $5 million for Love’s share of the royalties.

The singer said he addressed this most famous of the lawsuits in his autobiography because he felt he needed to present his side of the story.

“There was always the perception that my cousin Brian did all the writing as well as the producing and stuff like that. That was not true,” Love said. “I was the co-author of so many of the big hits. It’s just an unfortunate thing that happens, a terrible thing, because you have your uncle and your cousin; I don’t think of cheating people, and yet there are plenty that do, and my uncle was one of them.”

That explanation probably won’t change the minds of Love’s critics, and Love simply goes on about his business, leading the current edition of the Beach Boys as the group returns to its extensive schedule of live shows now that touring is resuming.

Love has also stepped up his recording activity lately. In 2017, he released a studio album, “Unleash The Love,” which featured unreleased songs he had written and recorded going back 10-plus years, as well as a disc of Beach Boys hits re-recorded by the current group. In 2018, he released a holiday album, “Reason for the Season.”

The following year, he released his third album in as many years, “12 Sides of Summer,” an eclectic collection which features mostly Love’s versions of songs by other artists, including such surprising choices as “Girl from Ipanema” and the Ramones’ “Rockaway Beach,” coupled with new versions of three Beach Boys songs, “Surfin’,” “Surfin’ Safari” and “It’s OK.”

“It was such a fun album to do,” Love said. “It’s an album designed to be fun to play for those summer parties and those barbecues at the lake or the beach, or in your car cruising around, whatever. It’s just one of those kinds of vibes – hopefully a good vibration.”

Several songs from the three recent albums have been popping up in Beach Boys shows.

“‘It’s OK’ has been in there quite a bit. ‘Rockaway Beach’ is definitely in,” Love said. “And ‘Here Comes the Sun’ is just gorgeous. We do that after ‘Pisces Brothers,’ the song that I wrote about myself and George [Harrison], for the ‘Unleash The Love’ album. So ... there are moments in the show where it’s really mystical and reflective and introspective as well as fun, euphoric.”